Blockchain Pharmaceutical Prototype Developed By DHL, Accenture

Logistics giant DHL and professional services giant Accenture have developed a serialization prototype using blockchain technology to track pharmaceuticals across the supply chain.

In a joint press release, the two companies said they developed a pharmaceutical prototype that tracks medicines from the point of origin to the consumer, monitoring potential tampering and errors. The ledger tracking these medicines may be shared with stakeholders, including manufacturers, warehouses, distributors, pharmacies, hospitals, and doctors.

DHL and Accenture have successfully conducted a proof-of-concept (PoC), which showed that it was possible to track and trace pharmaceutical products from manufacturing to patients, showing potential to eliminate counterfeiting of drugs. Lab-simulations demonstrated how blockchain could handle more than seven billion unique serial numbers and 1,500 transactions per second

Keith Turner, CIO Chief Development Office, DHL Supply Chain, said they see exciting potential for blockchain in pharmaceuticals, which is why they focused their proof of concept with Accenture on the life sciences and healthcare industry.

“By utilizing the inherent irrefutability within blockchain technologies, we can make great strides in highlighting tampering, reducing the risk of counterfeits, and actually saving lives,” said Turner.

Andreas Baier, Accenture lead for the travel and transportation industry and DHL client team leader, said that they’ve worked closely with DHL to understand and document the broad impact blockchain will have on supply chains of the future.

“Using a common, indelible, and secure ledger, the industry can achieve much higher safety standards – from the factory to the patient – at much lower cost,” said Baier. “This is one of several opportunities blockchain affords to restructure business processes while reducing cost and complexity.”

The blockchain pharmaceutical prototype is just one of the use cases highlighted in the companies’ trend report. According to the trend report, blockchain could also be used to streamline asset management and commercial processes. The report, however, stressed that “moving from concepts and pilot applications to actually deploying viable solutions will require the technology to be further developed, organizational transformation and a willingness to collaborate between all stakeholders.”